Memoirs of Akbar Hashemi - November 8, 2001

Hashemi's account of the MEK's efforts to restrict Seyyed Mohammad Khatami's visit to the United States
Conveying the message of the Society of Teachers of the Seminary of Qom by Sheikh Mohammad Yazdi to invite Hashemi to participate in the opening of the National Conference of the Clergy
Inauguration of the building of the Academy of Medical Sciences of the Islamic Republic of Iran and listening to the report of Dr. Iraj Fazel
Trip to Mashhad
Full text of the diary:
I worked in Kooshk's office until the evening. Mr. [Mohammad] Yazdi telephoned the Society of Teachers [of Qom Seminary] that they were holding a national conference of the clergy in Qom after the month of Ramadan and asked that it be opened with my speech. I packed my suitcase for the trip to Mashhad.
After the Maghrib and Isha prayers, we went to inaugurate the new building of the Academy of Medical Sciences, which had been given land and credit in the framework of the government's construction programs. After visiting its sections, I participated in the gathering of the affiliated and continuous members of the Academy. Dr. [Iraj] Fazel, [the head of the Academy], reported: "I talked about the need to determine the limits, salaries and costs for the academies, which are currently vague, and to expedite the completion of the huge building of the academies in the north of Tehran's Mosalla, which was started during the construction government and was supposed to be completed two years ago but is still unfinished, as well as the work on full health insurance and the employment of doctors in the villages by granting concessions.

 From there, we went to the airport and flew to Mashhad at 8:30 p.m. At the airport in Mashhad, Mr. [Abbas Vaez] Tabasi, [the Custodian of Astan Quds Razavi] and the officials of the province welcomed us. We talked with [Mr. Mohsen Mehralizadeh], the governor, and Mr. Tabasi. After dinner and the pilgrimage of Imam Reza (AS), I slept.
The United States is pressuring the Lebanese authorities to freeze Hezbollah's accounts and accept that Hezbollah is a terrorist organization, but the Lebanese government and other Lebanese officials oppose this proposal and consider Hezbollah a liberation force. The United States has so far designated 150 individuals or groups as terrorists, and in the United States, they have frozen their bank accounts, and in some Arab and Western countries, they have frozen their bank accounts and arrested a number of them. It was announced that 13 Saudi nationals who fought for the Taliban in Afghanistan have been killed.

The hypocrites [the Mojahedin-e Khalq Organization] in the United States have prepared a massive program against the presence of Mr. [Seyyed Mohammad] Khatami, [the president] at the United Nations, and have demanded that he be tried as a criminal and expelled from the United Nations. It is strange that the United States, while declaring the hypocrites terrorists, has allowed them to demonstrate and operate.